Home Secretary David Blunkett was today set to unveil plans to introduce a new offence of corporate manslaughter.

Home Secretary David Blunkett was today set to unveil plans to introduce a new offence of corporate manslaughter.

The proposed legislation would make companies accountable for deaths caused through gross management negligence.

Details of the Government's proposals were due to emerge during a ministerial response to an amendment tabled by Labour backbencher Andrew Dismore to the Criminal Justice Bill.

The Bill is currently in its report stage in the Commons.

According to research by the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents, around 350 people are killed in work-related accidents each year.

Victims of major accidents such as rail crashes have also pressed the Government to fulfil its 1997 commitment to introduce a corporate manslaughter offence.

Campaigners in favour of the change say the existing manslaughter laws make it difficult to prosecute large companies.

Under the proposals, directors of corporations can be found guilty of corporate killing if a management failure is identified as a cause of death and if that failure constitutes conduct that falls below a required standard.

Anne Jones, who has campaigned for the change since her son Simon was killed on his first day at work in Shoreham Docks in 1998, was sceptical.

"When I hear that the Government say they intend to enact the Bill they said that five years ago," she told BBC Radio 4's Today programme.